


Dance of A Lifetime

by lost_spook



Category: Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Dancing, F/M, Fandom Stocking 2013, Ficlet, Multi-Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-11
Updated: 2014-02-11
Packaged: 2018-01-11 23:42:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1179338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_spook/pseuds/lost_spook
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's trained for this moment all her life...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dance of A Lifetime

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Azar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azar/gifts).



> Written for Azarsuerte in Fandom Stocking 2013, from a random poetry prompt "and the last stroke of midnight dies".

The dance is complicated, full of intricate moves – they say it’s the most complex in the universe – but she’s trained all her life. Now she knows why.

He’s there, a stranger in beige against everyone else’s carnival colours: gold and silver and deepest reds and blues. An outsider has no hope of performing this dance to the Duke’s satisfaction, but he’s taken the challenge. The penalty for failure is death. She catches his gaze, wills him to her side: _Choose me, Doctor._ She takes his hand, and leans in; breathes: “Follow me.”

They dance; she knows the impossible steps and he’s reading her, matching her movements even more exactly than she’d hoped. _Clever boy_. Isn’t he always? It’s the star dance as it should be and almost never is – and at the end the Duke must pay – release his friends, and let him go.

Not her, though – she’s betrayed the court. She waits only to see him run before she sets her chin, meets her fate. _Brave heart, Clara._


End file.
